At the very beginning, in July, 1697, the king, by Bossuet’s instigation, wrote an urgent letter to the pope calling upon him speedily to condemn Fénelon’s book. Missive after missive of similar purport went forward, and all the arts of diplomacy, all the influences which Louis could in any way exert, were unblushingly employed for Fénelon’s overthrow. Affairs at Rome, indeed, before long involved themselves into a perfect tangle of chicanery and intrigue, cardinal against cardinal, ambassador against ambassador. Other courts besides that of France took a hand. The imperial ambassador worked hard for Fénelon; the Spanish minister was zealous on the other side; and a smaller potentate, Cosmo, Grand Duke of Tuscany, a dabbler in theology, threw his weight in the latter direction. The poor pope was violently pulled, now this way, now that. He greatly liked Fénelon, admiring his beautiful spirit and appreciating his loyal attachment to the Holy See. He resented the disgraceful attempt to browbeat him on the part of the desperate king and the Bishop of Meaux, a pragmatical, pugnacious bully. He could scarcely see any way of censuring any of Fénelon’s propositions without censuring also other writers of the same sort, like St. Bernard and St. Francis of Sales, whom the Church had delighted to honor. It seemed to him also, as was indeed the case, almost if not quite wholly a dispute about words. As to a habitual state of disinterested Divine love, the attainment of which was said to be inculcated in Fénelon’s writings, Fénelon himself uniformly declared his opinion that a permanent state of Divine love, without hope and without fear, was above the lot of man. And Bossuet himself allowed that there might be moments when the soul, dedicated to the love of God, would be lost in heavenly contemplation, and then love and adore without being influenced by either hope or fear, or being sensible of either. Their real ground of difference was, after all, very small, and there was much to be said on both sides. And, under all these circumstances, it is scarcely surprising that it took so long to reach a decision.